What's Been Going On: Thursday, 25 November - Sunday, 28 November, 2021

 

Holiday weekends are so often filled with hustle and bustle, but this one was calm and relaxed around here. Not quite as calm and relaxed as last year, when we went nowhere and did nothing, but still lovely all the same! I hope yours was just as lovely.

Here's what’s been going on around here lately.

 

Thursday, 25 November, 2021

After breakfast, I put the potatoes my daughter and I had made the day before, and as they filled the house with their delicious, cheesy, buttery aroma, I wrote my review for Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts) by Lev AC Rosen. I switched the potatoes out for the lentil shepherd’s pie, then I put some of my air-dried dresses in the dryer to briefly de-wrinkle. My husband rubbed my back, which was increasingly cranky, and then I hung up the dresses and got dressed.

And then it was off to my mother-in-law’s, our first maskless indoor gathering since before the pandemic! Everyone was vaccinated (most of us boosted) and feeling fine. It was a little weird trying to get used to being together indoors and not feel some level of paranoia- it’s going to take time and for the pandemic to be completely over for that to even start to happen, I think- but it was wonderful to spend time together again after so long.

 

By the time we left, I had a headache; by the time we got home, it had blossomed into a full-blown migraine. I don’t get these very often, but when I do, they’re whoppers. I fell asleep on the couch for a little bit in the hopes that that would knock it out, but by the time I woke up, it was worse. I went to bed after taking three Advil and two Tylenol PM and had to fight not to throw up until the Tylenol PM knocked me out.

 

Friday, 26 November, 2021

I woke up that morning only mildly headachey, thank goodness! Sometimes migraines hang around for a few days, but this wasn’t too bad. I had breakfast and wrote my Friday post, then posted my review for Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts).

And then it was time to head off to a local pharmacy! My daughter was due for Covid vaccine #2, and I qualified for my booster. She did great, no tears or anything. It’s a relief to know that she’s better protected from severe illness, and should she contract a breakthrough case, she would be contagious for fewer days. I was prepared for both of us to feel a little crummy, since I was down for about 24 hours after the second shot, but we got lucky and neither of us had any side effects!

 

At home, we had lunch, and I made a quick trip to Walgreens in order to pick up some just-in-case children’s fever reducer meds (we haven’t had to use any of ours since before the pandemic, and I’m pretty sure they’re all expired by now). I napped on my chair (migraines take a lot out of me!), then finished The Simplicity of Cider by Amy E. Reichert.

After dinner, I did my Duolingo, ran the dishwasher, showered, and virtually attended my synagogue’s Shabbat service. When that finished, I began reading Nurture the Wow: Finding Spirituality in the Frustration, Boredom, Tears, Poop, Desperation, Wonder, and Radical Amazement of Parenting by Danya Ruttenberg. My husband and I watched a segment of Wild, Wild Country on Netflix before bed.

 

Saturday, 27 November, 2021

After coffee, I scooped the litterbox. You’re welcome, kitty! <3

I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, tidied the kitchen, then sat down and wrote reviews for Love Is a Revolution by Renée Watson and The Simplicity of Cider by Amy E. Reichert. I began writing my monthly recap for my book blog (I always enjoy writing these, even though they can be lengthy!). After lunch, I cleaned the kitchen (my husband had made soup, along with a mess!), took out the compost and recycling, then swept both the upstairs and downstairs.

I did my 23 minute Pilates video and settled down to read Nurture the Wow (I wish I’d had this book when my daughter was younger!). My husband and daughter and I went on a brisk three-mile walk; it was cold out, but it felt nice to get moving after three days of cheese potatoes and pie! Back at home, I read more until dinner, then did my Duolingo.

My son stopped by! He’d been at work at his retail job the past two days and was full of Black Friday stories. It’s always so nice to see him. I showered my daughter, then showered myself, and she and I finished reading The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry before she went to bed. I read my own book for a bit, and my husband and I watched another segment of Wild, Wild Country on Netflix.

 

Sunday, 28 November, 2021

What a lovely, slow morning. I slept in late, then spent a long, snuggly morning with my husband and daughter. We don’t have nearly enough days like this, so I really appreciated it!

I ran the dishwasher and read after lunch, and then we drove to a local forest preserve to take a chilly walk with my sister-in-law, her son, and my father-in-law, whom we hadn’t seen since before the pandemic. It was brisk out there!

At home, I started this post, and then it was time to hit the kitchen. Latke time!!! If you’ve never had a latke before, you’re missing out. Latkes are crispy, potato-ey, oniony fried goodness, and I wait all year for them! I make seriously killer latkes. They’re amazing. I use this recipe. I cleaned as I went along (latkes use a LOT of dishes! A lat-ke of dishes? HAHAHAHA I’ll show myself out).

 

I lit the menorah for the first night, and my son stopped by! He had some Thanksgiving leftovers and, of course, some latkes.

After dinner, I did my Duolingo and showered, and then played some virtual Hanukkah games, like dreidel (we’re a modern family!), with my daughter. I put her to bed and we started reading Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli. I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher (almost full again!), sprinkled the stovetop with baking soda and vinegar, to sit overnight, then went upstairs to read. My husband and I watched the penultimate segment of Wild, Wild Country on Netflix before bed.

 

What a lovely week this has been. I’m sad for my daughter to go back to school, it was so pleasant having her home again! She’ll have three weeks and then be off for two and a half weeks for winter break, so I’ll have her back soon. I hope your Thanksgiving- or your weekend- was as equally relaxing as mine was!

Friday Links: 26 November, 2021

 It's Black Friday! Are you hitting the stores today? I went *once*, many, many years ago, and said NEVER AGAIN when I was in line. It was awful. My husband ran out this morning to pick up a few odds and ends, nothing Black Friday related, and said the stores were fairly empty. 

I'm having a very slow, quiet morning. I came down with an absolutely wretched migraine last night and ended up in bed at 7:30. Still a little headachey this morning, but zero other symptoms (my migraines are full-body affairs. Fortunately, I don't get them very often, but I think my body had been trying for one all this past week. I'm hoping I'll be good for a long time now!).

Not much in the terms of reading material this week, since I haven't spent much time online, but here's what I've got:

The Race to Understand 'Immune Amnesia'

Fascinating read about how the measles basically wipes out your immune system's entire memory and you have to rebuild your immunity to everything from scratch. It's something scientists are just now developing a good understanding of, despite measles having been around forever (being married to a scientist, I see a lot of this in action- bodies are complex and it's not always easy discovering the 'why.' All those memes out there disparaging the CDC for constantly changing directives on Covid- that's science in action. Recommendations change based on new information they've discovered about how the virus works, is transmitted, and affects us; that's how science works!). I'm wondering what discoveries we'll make about how Covid-19 affects the body's various systems. 

Amid Covid-19, Most Churches Provide Hybrid Worship, Half Stopped Picnics

So, this whole article is pretty fascinating. The data comes from the first year of what will be a five-year study of churches during the pandemic. 17% of churches had one or more members die of Covid; 37% had at least one staff member test positive for the virus. I'm definitely looking forward to seeing more results from this ongoing study (and Religion News Service is a really great social media follow, if you don't follow them already). 

That's it for this week. I hope you have a wonderful weekend! My daughter and I are supposed to get vaccinated later on today- her with #2, the booster for me. I had a rough 24 hours with #2, so I've got a whole lot of nothing planned for the next few days, just in case! : ) 

What's Been Going On: Monday, 22 November - Wednesday, 24 November, 2021

 

If you’re in the US, Happy Thanksgiving! If you’re elsewhere, happy Thursday! We’ve had a lovely, kind of lazy week around here. My daughter is off school and it’s been really nice to sleep in at least a little and lounge around in our cozy clothes. I hope you’re having an equally lovely start to your week!

Here's what I’ve been up to. Besides trying to see through the cat.

Monday, 22 November, 2021

After having breakfast, I published my Monday post here and my review of White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color by Ruby Hamad. Excellent book; highly recommended.

I filled the dishwasher and ran it, then tidied the kitchen and living room. My big goal for the week was to keep the house nice while everyone has been home! Never an easy task.

I stripped the bedding off my bed and stuffed it all in the wash, then began making my goal list for 2022. It’s important to have something to work towards! I finished reading Jack of Hearts by LC Rosen, then put lunch (some veggie nuggets I’d been saving for my daughter being off of school) in the oven. While those cooked, I switched the laundry, and swept the living room and kitchen.

After lunch, I restarted the dryer- bedding takes for-ev-er to dry- and then my daughter and I did a Pilates video together! It’s fun to have a workout buddy. She also participated in my 30 minutes of Read Harder (currently working my way through The Joy of Sects: A Spirited Guide to the World’s Religious Traditions by Peter Occhiogrosso), though she just read her regular book. I began the section on Judaism today; it felt nice to be back on some familiar territory! So much of the sections on Hinduism and Taoism felt way over my head.

I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, and when my husband got home, it was off to Parent-Teacher Conferences! Our daughter is doing well; she’s made the transition back to in-person school with no problems. Academically, she’s doing fantastically; she has no problems making friends, so that’s also good. She does need to stop giving adults the stink eye, which, uh, trust us, that’s something we’ve been trying to work on with her for YEARS. *gulp* Any advice there?

At home, I took out the garbage and rolled the cans to the curb, then worked on my grandmother’s cross-stitch for a bit while watching Swan’s Crossing on Tubi. Swan’s Crossing was a short-lived teen soap opera that ran back in the early 90’s and that I absolutely LOVED when I was twelve. It’s always nice to relive your youth a bit now and then, right? We had leftovers for dinner. I cleaned up, did my Duolingo, showered, remade the bed with my husband’s help, and started reading Love Is a Revolution by Renée Watson. My husband and I watched two episodes of Forensic Files before bed.

 

Tuesday 23 November, 2021

After breakfast, it was…Art Day!

So, last year, when my daughter started remote learning, she was nervous about doing art class all on her own. “So I’ll do it with you. Problem solved,” I told her, and I went out and bought a sketchbook and some drawing pencils that night. Most Wednesdays (which is when she had art class), she and I worked on art assignments together, and it ended up being a lot of fun! She colored and drew and made a bunch of Hanukkah decorations (including a sign she made for me that says, “I love you a latke!”). I worked on this wave, which I’m not quite finished with yet:

 

 The Hebrew writing is Amos 5:24: ‘But let justice well up like water, righteousness like an unfailing stream.’ Something that’s been on my mind lately. I’m going to eventually use my colored pencils to give this some color when it’s completely finished, and I may try to write the Hebrew a little better, or in a more artistic style (my Hebrew printing is terrible). We’ll see!

We had lunch (I’m not a natural artist; drawing anything takes me ages), and I finished Love Is a Revolution, since our internet was down and we couldn’t do Pilates! I cleaned up, took out the compost, swept the upstairs and downstairs, and my daughter worked on my Read Harder challenge with me for 30 minutes. I had a little bit of a headache, but I started The Simplicity of Cider by Amy E. Reichert (chosen solely because it’s set in Door County, Wisconsin, and I figured it would be nice to armchair-travel back there!) and read for just a little bit before my son called and needed some advice.

Afterwards, I dropped off my library books, then grabbed some pizza from Little Caesar’s. Sometimes you just need someone else to make the pizza, right? It absolutely hit the spot. After dinner, I did my Duolingo, showered, and put my daughter to bed before diving back into my book. My husband and I watched the first part of the documentary Wild Wild Country, about the cult that moved to Antelope, Oregon. Fascinating stuff!

 

Wednesday, 24 November, 2021

After breakfast, I scooped the litterbox (and washed my hands- I really hope that doesn’t need to be stated!), and then it was time to get started on Thanksgiving cooking!

My daughter was up in her room cutting out paper dolls (yes, kids still play with those! She’s obsessed), and I dove into making Sweet Potato Shepherd’s Pie. I cooked the lentils first in my Instant Pot (in vegetable broth; this gives them a little more flavor), chopped my onions, and then started on the sweet potatoes. When the lentils were done, I put the sweet potatoes in to steam, and then cooked the mixture that makes up the bottom layer. The sweet potatoes were mashed (they smelled amazing!), and then everything was assembled into two pans and covered and tucked into the fridge.

Afterwards, my daughter helped me make what I always jokingly refer to as The Family Cheese Potatoes of Shame. They contain so much butter and cheese that that alone would make them worthy of the name, but then they also contain Velveeta (or a store brand, which is cheaper), which doesn’t even have enough dairy in it to rightfully be called cheese (the package says something like Dairy Melt). This is the only time I EVER eat this stuff, but it’s just not Thanksgiving without it; we had these at basically every family get-together on my dad’s side when I was young, so no matter how health-conscious I get (and there are definitely times when I lean more that direction!), these are always on the table this time of year.

When the potatoes were done, into the fridge they went, and I cleaned up, unloading and reloading the dishwasher. I brought the garbage and recycling cans in from the curb, took out the compost and recycling, and wiped down the kitchen counters. And then it was time for an hour’s worth of volunteer work. Today, I finished compiling my list of mental health resources and moved on to a list of legal resources for my state. My daughter played paper dolls while I worked.

After lunch, she did more Pilates with me (OOF! Tough today!), and then we got down to my Read Harder project. I tried to nap afterwards- Pilates wore me out- but it didn’t work, so I ended up working on this post instead. Spaghetti for dinner, because who cooks a full meal the night before Thanksgiving?

I did my Duolingo and showered, then did another not-quite-full-hour worth of volunteer work (I’m going to try to sneak some more in in the morning while my potatoes and Shepherd’s Pie cook). I loaded and ran the dishwasher, then sliced some zucchini for my husband and I to snack on with hummus later on. And then it was time to read and watch TV with the husband (who just got his first haircut since February of 2020!!! He looks AWESOME!).

 

And that’s it for now. I’ve got food in the oven right now, baking so I can take it to my mother-in-law’s. Everyone is vaccinated and still very careful, masking everywhere we go; this will be our first indoor family gathering since before the pandemic. Friday, my daughter gets vaccine #2 and I get my booster shot, so I may have some not-so-productive days ahead. Fingers crossed!

 

I hope you have a wonderful day, wherever you are!

What's Been Going On: Thursday 18 November - Sunday 21 November 2021

A new week begins! A holiday week, if you’re in the US. Thanksgiving has always been my favorite: lots of family coziness and good food (made better as I grew into an adult who learned how to cook. Lots of Thanksgivings as a kid where I was only able to eat potatoes and a roll. Feed your vegetarian friends and family members, folks!). We’ll be celebrating with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law; everyone is vaccinated, most are boosted (my daughter gets #2 the next day and I’ll receive my booster at the same time), and I’m looking forward to all the delicious vegetarian Thanksgiving food, because my mother-in-law is an amazing cook!

My husband, who has been learning both to weld and to do some amateur blacksmithing, made me this bookmark. It says 💙VEGGIE on it, and it fits perfectly into my books. I love it! 

Here's what I’ve been up to the past few days.

 

Thursday, 18 November, 2021

After getting dressed and having coffee, I scooped the litterbox, loaded the dishwasher, and updated this blog. I dropped my daughter off at school, made a fruitless trip to Target *sigh* and then stopped by the grocery store to pick up some zucchini and two discount eggplants ($3 total).

At home, I did an hour’s worth of volunteer work and tidied the living room, then it was off to lunch with my daughter. Another fruitless trip afterwards to Michael’s and Bed Bath & Beyond (more on this later! SO. VERY. FRUSTRATING). At home, I had lunch and wrote out my Friday post and did school pickup (I skipped Read Harder and Pilates today; just not enough time!). I picked my daughter up at school, threw some sweet potatoes in the Instant Pot, and helped my daughter with her spelling words and math homework while the leftovers of the taco-rice casserole from the other night warmed in the oven.

We ate dinner, I did my Duolingo, cleaned up, ran the dishwasher, and showered, and I read my book, and watched two episodes of Forensic Files with my husband before bed.

 

 Friday, 19 November, 2021

 After having coffee and getting ready, I unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, then chopped up some onion, cauliflower, and carrots for a batch of Cauliflower Potato Soup for dinner (one of my daughter’s favorites!).

I then dropped my daughter off at school and drove to a Target 30 minutes away, where I FINALLY found what I’d been looking for ALL. WEEK. LONG:

HANUKKAH CANDLES!!!!!!!

 SERIOUSLY. It only took FIVE STORES to find these things. I figured I would just run over to the Target by me and grab them like I did last year. On my first trip, I just assumed they didn’t have their Hanukkah endcap out yet (yup, you read that right. We get an endcap- SOMETIMES. Think of that the next time you’re looking through Christmas pajamas for your dog and walking by the 324837249832 aisles of Christmas stuff), but it became apparent on my second trip that they didn’t have the Hanukkah endcap at all this year. I’d heard Michaels and Bed Bath & Beyond were selling Hanukkah items, so that’s why I tried there on Thursday, but nothing. Not a single Hanukkah item at either store. Finally, I checked Target’s website and found ONE SINGLE STORE near me selling Hanukkah candles.

ONE.

Talk about depressing.

But I was deeply grateful to find them at all, and I gleefully drove home with my multiple boxes of candles. I started a load of laundry and set out to prepare the soup. I took out the recycling and the compost, then got the bread dough started in the bread machine. I switched out my Shabbat candles, folded and put laundry away, and made my daughter’s bed.

After taking lunch to my daughter, I stopped by the Dollar Tree in hopes of finding some blue and silver garland- Hanukkah colors!- to wrap around my banister.

NOPE.

SIGH. But I did come home with a few extra pairs of gloves for my daughter, so the trip wasn’t a total wash. I ate lunch, did my 20 minutes of Pilates, then switched/hung my laundry and put the bread in pans to rise. I spent 30 minutes on my Read Harder book.

I picked my daughter up from school, blended the soup, and put the bread in to bake. Being the mean mom I am, I made my daughter complete her math homework- she’s off school this upcoming week for Thanksgiving break, but I wanted her to get the math out of the way. Fortunately, she finished it without too much complaining. ;)

Soup for dinner!

After dinner, I did my Duolingo, put dinner away and cleaned up, ran the dishwasher, then showered. I attended my synagogue’s services virtually, then watched two episodes of Forensic Files with my husband before bed.

 

Saturday, 20 November, 2021

After having coffee and getting dressed, I ran a few errands. I’d realized earlier in the week that there was no way I was going to engage in my weekly grocery shopping this upcoming week, not with my grocery shopping day falling on THE DAY BEFORE THANKSGIVING. YIKES. So I ran out to a local grocery store and Aldi to pick up some extras to get us through that week. Forty-nine cent sweet potatoes made me pretty happy!

At home, I put the groceries away, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, and we decorated the banister with the blue and silver garland my husband had brought home from Walmart (WOOHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!). My daughter and I walked down to the neighbor’s to pick up the baby she offered to give us, one of about fifty she’s given away. Everyone, I’d like you to meet Bernie:

 

 Isn’t he adorable? I’ve never had an aloe plant before, but it sounds like he comes from prolific stock, so I’m curious to see how this will go.

I hung out with my family and had lunch, and after lunch, my daughter had her first playdate since March of 2020. I spent about an hour chatting with the friend’s mom, and while the girls played, I finished reading White Tears/Brown Scars.

My husband made macaroni and cheese for dinner. I cleaned up, did my Duolingo, showered, began reading Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts) by LC Rosen, and watched the episode of 20/20 about the Turpin siblings (it’s available on Hulu if you’re in the US; outside, you can view it in parts on YouTube; I believe it’s called ‘Escape from the House of H0rr0rs’ with 0’s for the o’s in the word ‘horror’). It’s disturbing, but absolutely worth the watch.

 

Sunday, 21 November 2021

Coffee and scooping the litterbox. Always a great start to the morning!

I wrote up my review for White Tears/Brown Scars, then loaded and ran the dishwasher. I tidied the living room and began work on this post, and then my mother-in-law called! I hadn’t chatted with her in a while, so we had a nice talk.

After lunch, my husband and daughter and I went for a walk, since it was such a beautiful day out. Back home, I picked up Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts) and read for a bit, then got sleepy and dozed on my chair. Ahh, those weekend naps! I read for a good long while when I woke up, and we all had leftovers for dinner. I did my Duolingo, showered, emptied and refilled the dishwasher. I put my daughter to bed, read more, and watched two episodes of Forensic Files before going to bed.

And that’s it! It’s so nice having my daughter home from school this week. While I’m definitely glad she’s back to full-time in-person school, I really enjoy the days she’s home as well. We have parent teacher conferences this afternoon (she got an amazing report card, so we’re really proud of her!), but other than that, it’ll be a nice slow day around here.

 

What have you been up to lately???

Friday Links, 11 November, 2021

 

It’s Friday once again!

Not a lot of plans for this weekend, really. My daughter has her first playdate since March 2020. The house is in pretty good shape. I do need to sit down and write out my Thanksgiving menu, but otherwise, I plan on spending a lot of time reading, which is really the best kind of weekend.

Here’s what I found interesting online this week:

 

Georgetown Study: “To succeed in America, it’s better to be born rich than smart.”

The headline kind of says it all, but the article is worth a read. Americans who are born rich wind up more successful in life than Americans who are born into poor families but who score better on tests than the rich kids. And yet so many people find it acceptable to sneer at the poor and accuse them of being lazy, not working hard enough, not being smart enough. It’s pretty depressing. We’re not quite the land of opportunity that we like to imagine ourselves being.

 

Politifact: No evidence George Washington said it’s ‘impossible to rightly govern without God and the Bible.’

Beware of what you read online, folks. I saw someone repost a meme that quoted George Washington, and with all that I’ve read of American history, it sounded suspicious, so I dug around a little, and yeah, there’s no evidence in Washington’s writings that he ever stated anything like that. Not everything shared on Facebook is legit. Check your sources.

 

Antivax Racists Are Trying to Repurpose the Yellow Star of David

Hooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo boy.

I’ve seen SO much of this. People who don’t want the Covid-19 vaccine comparing themselves to Jews in the Holocaust. People at anti-mask and anti-vaccine protests sticking a yellow Magen David on themselves and fake-crying about how persecuted they are.

Do. Not. Do. This.

As a Jewish woman, this infuriates me. You know what persecution looks like these days? It’s attending a service at your synagogue with a weeping family because that family’s relatives were murdered at the Tree of Life Shooting in Pittsburgh. It’s dancing with the Torah with complete and utter joy on Simchat Torah, or having your rabbi wish you a peaceful Shabbat, and then exiting the synagogue and walking by the massive security system and the two police cars that are stationed outside our every service because there are people who want us dead. It’s picking out a new pair of dress shoes to wear to synagogue and having to consider if you can run to safety in them if necessary before you consider if you can afford them or if you like how they look or if they fit well. It’s constantly seeing hateful, antisemitic posts on social media and knowing those people could be waiting in the shadows for you, or plotting to harm your friends or the place you worship. A synagogue in Austin was the site of an arson attack recently; someone also threatened to blow up a St. Louis synagogue. My synagogue has been the site of a vandalism attack; another local one I attended classes at had a pipe bomb threat. This is what Jews today go through every day of our lives.

Persecution is not being asked to participate in public health measures against the virus that has killed almost 750,000 of our fellow Americans in less than two years. It’s insulting to us as Jews that so many people want to cosplay our persecution but have zero idea of what living as a member of a targeted group actually looks and feels like. Don’t do this. Don’t compare yourself to Jews, and for the love of all that is holy, don’t repost memes that compare not wanting to be vaccinated to what we suffered in the Holocaust, unless you want your Jewish friends to never, ever consider you a friend again.

 

For many ICU survivors and their families, life is never the same.

This is yet another tragedy of Covid-19, which is and has been a mass-disabling event from the beginning. Lungs are not forgiving organs, and Covid is also neurological in nature. We’re going to be living with the consequences of this for a very, very long time, and I worry for the people who have survived it and the lifelong damage they’re going to live with- for what I suspect for many will be a shortened life. People who spend 30, 40, 50 or more days on a ventilator don’t bounce back easily; sometimes they never do, and the damage caused by both the virus and the effects of the machinery needed to sustain their lives may leave their bodies susceptible to even minor infections. I worry deeply what this upcoming cold and flu season is going to look like for survivors, especially those who aren’t taking the best precautions to keep themselves safe.

 

Thousands of Military Families Struggle with Food Insecurity

This is not a new problem. My ex-husband was in the military when we were married, and there were many times we went without food because we had no money. We qualified for food baskets most years during the holidays. It does look as though there are members of Congress taking steps to fix this problem, which is good, but it should never, ever have been a problem in the first place. For all the blustering so many people like to do about THANK YOU MILITARY MEMBERS AND VETERANS!!11!1!!, you think they’d put their money where their mouth is, but I suppose it’s just easier to thank someone than work to ensure those people’s actual physical needs are met. Think about that next time you thank a veteran or a military member, and instead of just thanking them, do something- make a donation to a charity, write to your member of congress- to make sure they have things like food and access to adequate mental health care. Thanking them is nice, but it really does little more than make you feel good about yourself. No one should ever go hungry.

And something a little more uplifting…

 

“Seventy Faces to the Torah”- and Grateful for All of Them.

Just a nice little article on how Jews view the Hebrew Bible. We’re not literalists; a good Torah study is more akin to a debate you might see at a book club. People disagree with each other, they argue, and that’s all part of it! There are so many different and beautiful meanings to be found, and we all bring our own diverse lenses to view it, resulting in different points of view and different interpretations. If you weren’t aware there was a difference between how Jews and Christians approach biblical texts, this might shed some light on the subject. Rabbi Elliot Dorff is a wonderful writer; I’ve encountered his writings before, and he’s always insightful.

 

And that’s it for this week! I hope you all have a wonderful, relaxing weekend full of all the things you love. Shalom, friends. :)

What's Been Going On: 15-17 November, 2021

 

Hello, hello!

Bit of a quiet start to the week around here, for the most part. We’ve had a mix of warmer-for-this-time-of-year weather and some chilly days, and mostly gray skies and rain, but I never mind that. There’s nothing like curling up with a crocheted blanket in my big reading chair when the weather is dreary.

Here's what I’ve been up to so far this week.

 

Monday, 15 November, 2021

 

My back wasn’t great when I woke up; my left side was really unhappy with me. Not a fun start to the week!

After getting dressed and having breakfast with my daughter, I unloaded the dishwasher and ran it empty to clean it, then tidied the kitchen and the living room. I dropped my daughter off at school, and after I pulled into the driveway, I took a minute to collect all the recycling from inside the car (my family is MESSY!) into a bag that I had brought out for that purpose, and I placed those items in the recycling bin.

I took the compost out, then prepared the vegetables and sauce for Sheet Pan Cashew Tofu (and made another run out to the compost). I then spent 20 minutes straightening the basement, which VERY badly needed it. You could hardly walk down there, and now the floor is clean! I feel really good about that. : )

I wrote and posted my review for The Secret History of Home Economics: How Trailblazing Women Harness the Power of Home and Changed the Way We Live by Danielle Dreilinger. Afterwards, I relaxed in my chair and checked in on some of my favorite homemaking blogs.

I took my daughter her lunch, and after pulling back in the driveway, I cleaned the trash out of the car into a bag I’d brought out specifically for that. All the trash went directly into the outdoor trash can!

After lunch, I took out the recycling, sliced the tofu to marinate, made my daughter’s bed, and spent a few extra minutes straightening some things in the basement. Upstairs, I swept the living room and kitchen, decided against doing Pilates because my back was still feeling cranky, and spent 30 minutes with my Read Harder book (The Joy of Sects: A Spirited Guide to the World’s Religious Traditions by Peter Occhiogrosso).

Upon further contemplation, I remembered that the last time I made Sheet Pan Cashew Tofu, I had wished I’d doubled the sauce, so I made another batch. I put the rice in the rice cooker, finished going through my favorite homemaking blogs, then tidied a few of my daughter’s toys that had been moldering away in the hallway for weeks.

I played around online for a bit to rest, helped my daughter with her homework, put the vegetable/tofu mix in the oven to roast, and refilled my olive oil container (I buy olive oil in 3 liter cans, which is really impractical to pour from, so I pour it into a repurposed coffee creamer bottle. Not the fanciest, but it works just fine!).

 

Read to roast! 

And ready to eat!

Dinner was DELICIOUS- if you’re craving any kind of Asian delivery but don’t want to spend the money, make this (I linked it above). Double the sauce, and if you don’t do tofu, you can substitute chicken or whatever kind of meat you eat. It’s so, so good. I did my Duolingo, put the rest of dinner away, cleaned the kitchen, took out the garbage and recycling again and dragged the cans to the road, and then I went and showered.

I put my daughter to bed and read my book until my husband came upstairs, and we watched two episodes of Forensic Files.

 

Tuesday, 16 November, 2021

After getting dressed and ready, I scooped the litterbox. Such a fun way to start the morning! I love my old man cat, though, so I never mind.

I cooked up some taco-spiced lentils in the Instant Pot, then wiped down the stovetop and unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher before dropping my daughter off at school. At home, I spent twenty minutes organizing the basement bookshelves, then cleaned off my daughter’s toys from the stairs (they’d also been there for weeks!). Finally, I was able to fully sweep the upstairs hallway and stairs, and I swept the living room as well.

It was early, but I picked up The Joy of Sects and read for 30 minutes (started the section on Taoism), and then I cooked up some chopped green pepper and made a taco lentil rice casserole kind of thing that I just kind of invented in order to use up a bunch of leftover rice I didn’t want going bad (I stirred the rice together with four eggs- it was a LOT of rice!- the green pepper, the lentils I’d cooked earlier, and a bunch of salsa). I put that in the fridge, prepared my daughter’s lunch, and took it over to her at the school.

After lunch, I did a new twenty-minute Pilates video, since my back was feeling- not quite okay, but at least up to the task, and since I was up afterwards, I took out the compost. I read White Tears/Brown Scars by Ruby Hamad until my husband got home, and then it was time for a library run. My daughter’s book was overdue, yikes! I grabbed her several new books; I also picked out three books for me.

 

 

What I’ll be reading next.

I continued reading at home until I needed to help my daughter with her math, then threw the casserole in the oven. It turned out fantastic, and I’ll definitely continue making that to use up leftover rice. I did my Duolingo, cleaned the kitchen, and ran the dishwasher. After showering, I read my book, and my husband and I watched two episodes of Forensic Files.

 

Wednesday, 17 November, 2021

Grocery day! After breakfast and getting ready, I made out my grocery list. Nothing really great on sale this week, unfortunately. I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher and dropped my daughter off at school.

Two grocery stores to stop at this week; $14 at a local store, and $51 at Aldi, which is about normal for us ($5 of that Aldi total was for a gift for my daughter!). At home, I put the groceries away and settled down to do an hour of volunteer work while listening to JBSTV. Today, I compiled lists of mental health resources for my state (I’m almost done with this list!) while listening to an interview with author Tal Keinan. He was such an intriguing interviewee that when my hour was up, I put his book, God Is in the Crowd: A Model for Post-Diaspora Judaism on hold via interlibrary loan.

I prepared my daughter’s lunch and took it to her at school. At home, I had lunch, did my 20 minutes of Pilates and 30 minutes of my Personal Read Harder challenge, and then, due to a terrible night’s sleep, took a nap for about an hour in my reading chair. Some days, it’s the only thing you can do!

I baked a pizza from Aldi for dinner and helped my daughter with her spelling words afterwards. I visited a few homemaking blogs, showered, and cleaned up the kitchen. I finished checking the blogs, then put my daughter to bed and read until my husband came upstairs. We watched two episodes of Forensic Files before going to bed.

 

And that’s it for now! We’ll see how today goes. My back seems to be okay, but I woke up with a headache that’s just this side of a migraine. NOT FUN. I don’t know how much I’ll get done today; I suppose that all depends on how this headache goes. Wish me luck, and I hope you’re all doing well and having a productive week!

What's Been Going On: Thursday, 11 November - Sunday, 14 November, 2021

Welcome to Monday!

It’s been calm days around here; not much going on, but that’s never a bad thing. Here’s what I’ve been up to.

 

Thursday, 11 November, 2021

After having breakfast and getting ready, I put some beans in the Instant Pot. It was a wet, sloppy school drop-off in the rain, and I was glad to get home, where I did another hour of volunteer work on the computer, listening to a JBSTV program on Holocaust survivors in the background. I spent 20 minutes and then a little extra cleaning out my daughter’s room (which is taking shape nicely!), and afterwards, I was exhausted. I had switched the sheets on her bed- lots of bending, which is hard on my back, so I rested and poked around on the computer until it was time for lunch with my daughter.

At home, I ate lunch, swept the floor, and did my Pilates video. I did my 30 minutes of my Personal Read Harder challenge, then unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher. Since it was a cold and gross rainy day, I prepared a batch of Tortilla Soup (to which I added black beans) and cleaned up afterwards. No recipe link, since this comes from a cookbook, but it’s warm and delicious and comforting when the temperature drops!

I sat down to browse some homemaking blogs, but as soon as I read Torrie’s post on food waste, I leapt up. I had meant to put the remains of the black bean burgers I’d made earlier this week in the garage freezer the day before but had forgotten, so I did that right then. And when I came back in, I spotted the last mushy banana of the bunch on the kitchen island and immediately threw that into a batch of muffins using the recipe from The Complete Tightwad Gazette’s Create-a-Muffin Mix. I put my batter into the fridge, since I didn’t need to bake it right then, and settled back down to browse the homemaking blogs.

I ordered two books from interlibrary loan, read for twenty-five minutes, and then left to pick my son up to drop him off at work across town. After dinner, I wrote Friday’s post, showered, cleaned up the kitchen, put dinner away, ran the dishwasher, and did my Duolingo.

I read my book and watched two episodes of Forensic Files with my husband before bed.

 

Friday, 12 November, 2021

After breakfast and getting ready with my daughter, I scooped the litterbox, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, and chopped and steamed some broccoli in the Instant Pot. I put a load of laundry on to wash before dropping my daughter off at school, then came home to prepare an Impossibly Easy Vegetable Pie. I put the uncooked casserole in the fridge, cleaned up, then switched some of the laundry to the dryer and hung the rest. I was extremely dismayed to find one of my dresses had shredded in the wash. This had been a new dress I’d barely worn, which only strengthened my resolve to usually buy used clothes; if they lasted that long, they’ll likely last a little longer.

I folded and put away a load of laundry and tidied the living room. By then, my back wasn’t feeling great- I’m very aware of my danger symptoms and this was one of them, so I sat down to rest it, browsing my homemaking blogs and going through email.

I took an early lunch break with yogurt and an apple before having lunch with my daughter; we started a reread of All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor (we’d read this when she was about four, but she didn’t remember it, so I figured a reread was in order!). And then it was off to take my son on an errand, which is why I had eaten a little something earlier; I wasn’t sure how long this would take. As it was, it didn’t take long, so I dropped him off and came home and ate a vegetarian chik’n patty for the rest of my lunch.

My back felt better enough to do my Pilates; afterwards, I did my 30 minutes of Read Harder, then put yesterday’s muffin batter into a muffin tin and made a trip to the compost with the day’s organic material. I wiped down the stovetop, because I splatter stuff all over it like it’s my job on a daily basis!

School pick-up did not go well; my daughter came home in a mood and I spent the next hour dealing with her behavior while the muffins baked. OY. We had to run and drop my son off at work, then we came home and I put the casserole in the oven to bake while I showered. The Impossibly Easy Vegetable Pie is absolutely delicious (I made mine with broccoli, garlic, and onions, no peppers); next time, I’ll double the recipe. It’s THAT good. After dinner, I watched a few YouTube recipes with my daughter snuggled next to me (in a much better mood, thankfully!), and when my husband put her to bed, it was time to log in for my synagogue’s livestreamed Shabbat services.

I’m really looking forward to being able to attend in person (still masked!) on a regular basis in a few weeks when my daughter is fully vaccinated; we’ve been really isolated the last two years in order to keep exposure to all of us, and then to her, as low as possible. But now that she’s had her first vaccine, I’m feeling like there’s more of a light at the end of the tunnel. I feel incredibly lucky, however, that the technology exists that I can still “attend” services while staying safe, and I’m deeply appreciative of all the hard work my rabbis and synagogue staff put in to ensuring that those of us at home don’t miss out.

After services were over, my husband and I watched two episodes of Forensic Files.

 

13 November

Ahhh, what a relaxed, lazy Shabbat!

I don’t always get to have such a calm Saturday. I’m a Reform Jew; we do our best but understand that life happens and it’s not always possible to turn all of the world off, but this was a pretty good one. I ran the dishwasher after a long, leisurely breakfast (it was already full; I had just forgotten to run it the night before), then read with my daughter in her bedroom for 30 minutes as part of her weekend homework. Then I just hung out with her while she drew and colored; we talked about her cousins, school, bikkur cholim (the mitzvah of visiting the sick and what that might look like in a time like this), and various other things before lunch. I read a little more afterwards, then took a long, leisurely nap. SO nice.

I made cinnamon vanilla waffles and scrambled eggs for dinner, did my Duolingo, showered, and read an article that had lingered in an open tab on my computer all week. After putting my daughter to bed, I read my book and watched two episodes of Forensic Files with my husband.

 

14 November, 2021

After breakfast and getting ready, I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, then tidied the kitchen. I did a little bit of work on this blog post, and when the thrift store opened, I headed over there to check out their dresses (I don’t have a huge wardrobe of dresses, so when I lose one, it hurts!). I found THREE!, plus a pair of pants for my daughter.

 Not the greatest shot, but I have nowhere to display them! The long gray one will be worn with a tanktop; it’s a bit low-cut for my style otherwise. All will be worn with leggings underneath, and a cardigan on top.

At home, I had lunch and then walked around the block with my daughter, who wanted to play in the four flakes of snow that were falling. She regretted her decision about five hundred feet into our walk, since with the windchill it was all of twenty-five degrees, along with being icy and drippy out, but we soldiered on and made it! Once we were indoors and warm again, my daughter and I snuggled under one of my crocheted blankets; she played on her Kindle, and I read, then dozed for a bit. When I woke back up, I finally finished reading The Secret Life of Home Economics by Danielle Dreilinger. Well-written and information-packed; that’s why it took me a week to read it!

My husband had made sushi for lunch, so we ate more of that for dinner. I did my Duolingo, showered, cleaned up the kitchen, and ran the dishwasher. My back wasn’t feeling great at this point- kind of the same way it felt on Friday (and it’s still not great right now. Le sigh…), so I hopped into bed and began reading White Tears, Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color by Ruby Hamad. My husband and I watched two episodes of Forensic Files before going to bed.

 

And that’s it! I’m going to try to get as much done as I can this week, but that’ll depend on how my back holds up. I hope you’re having a great start to your week!